Search form

Dana Campbell

Dana Campbell finished her PhD in evolutionary biology from Harvard University in 1999. Since then she has enjoyed the benefits of exploring many topics in biology as an independent scholar and at-home mom in Maryland. She spends summers with her husband and two daughters, ages 5 and 9, at the University of Washington marine biology research labs in the beautiful San Juan Islands.

Most Recent Articles

My kids are counting down to the last day of school. This morning I heard the daily update: 9 days left. They’ve had it. They are both exhausted and tired of the grinding routine: wake up early, long day at school, homework, dinner, daily afterschool programs, choir, piano lessons and practice, etc, etc. Swim practices have stopped, as the season is over, but the (considerable) time this frees up quickly dissipates into special end of year performances, practices, field trips, ceremonies, and although a little different, these weigh on my kids too. Summer vacation is looking good in their eyes. I blogged before about how our family is relocating across the country this summer. This will certainly shake things up this summer – a cure to the blahs of long-term, rigorous school routine.

Thanks to all for the thoughtful and helpful responses to my last blog about moving with kids. After several weeks of wrenching angst about whether to accept a new academic position on the other side of the country, we’ve taken the plunge. Oh. My. Gosh. We’re moving! Here, in a nutshell, is our emotional rollercoaster so far:

For the last 12 years, I have faithfully monitored the faculty job listings pages in the Chronicle of Higher Ed and IHE even though my husband and I are happily employed. Why? Because we live on the “wrong” coast. We are 3000 miles away from both sets of our aging parents and families, and for us this is a hardship.

Last week, out of the blue, I received an email from my Ph.D. advisor with a subject line: “a question about your thesis.” It’s been 15 years since I completed my thesis, so, intrigued, I opened the email…

The last couple weekends around home have been math weekends. Not by choice, not by design, not for fun. My daughter brings home a fair amount of math homework from middle school. She’s actually pretty good at it but she doesn’t realize this, because (her words) she thinks her friends are all better than she is at doing it. To be fair, the work is hard.

In a casual bedtime discussion on potential careers with my almost-13-year-old daughter, she recapitulated to me her long-standing intent to become a writer, a teacher, and a mother. But above all these aspirations, she admitted, she wants to be famous.

The end of 2011 was a mad, crazy flurry in our household. Between the season’s added extras: visits from family and friends, shopping for gifts, driving kids around, a science fair experiment (etc) and finishing some high priority work items over the holidays we did manage to catch up on some tasks (and sleep!) postponed through much of the fall. Still, a lot still remains to be done.